Fighting the Flames. Robert Michael Ballantyne
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sir—”
“You must not say ‘La!’ my girl,” interrupted Mr Auberly with a frown, “nor use exclamations of any kind in my presence; what are the ‘some things’ referred to?”
“Sure I don’t know, sir,” said the abashed Matty. “I s’pose there’s a-many things I ain’t very good at; but, please, sir, I don’t mean to do nothin’ wrong, sir, I don’t indeed; an’ I’ll try to serve you well, sir, if it wor only to plaaze my missis, as I’m leavin’ against my will, for I love my—”
“There, that will do,” said Mr Auberly somewhat sternly, as the girl appeared to be getting excited.
“Ring that bell; now, go downstairs and Hopkins will introduce you to my housekeeper, who will explain your duties to you.”
Hopkins entered and solemnly marched Martha Merryon to the regions below.
Mr Auberly locked away his papers, pulled out his watch, wound it up, and then, lighting a bedroom candle, proceeded with much gravity upstairs.
He was a very stately-looking man, and strikingly dignified as he walked upstairs to his bedroom—slowly and deliberately, as though he were marching at his own funeral to the tune of something even deader than the “Dead March in Saul.”
It is almost a violation of propriety to think of Mr Auberly doing such a very undignified thing as “going to bed!” Yet truth requires us to tell that he did it; that he undressed himself as other mortals do; that he clothed himself in the wonted ghostly garment; and that, when his head was last seen—in the act of closing the curtains around him—there was a conical white cap on it, tied with a string below the chin, and ornamented on the top with a little tassel, which waggled as though it were bidding a triumphant and final adieu to human dignity!
Half an hour later, Mrs Rose, the housekeeper, a matronly, good-looking woman, with very red cheeks, was busy in the study explaining to Matty Merryon her duties. She had already shown her all over the house, and was now at the concluding lesson.
“Look here now, Merryon,” began the housekeeper.
“Oh, please don’t call me Merryon—I ain’t used to it. Call me Matty, do now!”
“Very well, Matty,” continued Mrs Rose, with a smile, “I’ve no objection; you Irish are a strange race! Now, look here. This is master’s study, and mind, he’s very partikler, dreadful partikler.”
She paused and looked at her pupil, as if desirous of impressing this point deeply on her memory.
“He don’t like his papers or books touched; not even dusted! So you’ll be careful not to dust ’em, nor to touch ’em even so much as with your little finger, for he likes to find ’em in the mornin’ just as he left ’em at night.”
“Yes, Mrs Rose,” said Matty, who was evidently giving up her whole soul to the instruction that was being imparted.
“Now,” continued the housekeeper, “the arranging of this room will be your last piece of work at night. You’ll just come in, rake out the grate, carry off the ashes, lay the noo fire, put the matches handy on the chimney-piece, look round to see that all’s right, and then turn off the gas. The master is a early riser, and lights the fire his-self of a mornin’.”
“Yes, ’m,” said Matty, with a courtesy.
“Now, go and do it,” said Mrs Rose, “that I may see you understand it. Begin with the grate an’ the ashes.”
Matty, who was in truth an experienced maid-of-all-work, began with alacrity to discharge the duties of her new station. She carried off the ashes, and returned with the materials for next day’s fire in a shovel. Here she gave a slight indication of her so-called carelessness (awkwardness would have been more appropriate) by letting two or three pieces of stick and a bit of coal fall on the carpet, in her passage across the room.
“Be careful, Matty,” said Mrs Rose gently. “It’s all owin’ to haste. Take your time, an’ you won’t do such things.”
Matty apologised, picked up the materials, and laid the fire. Then she took her apron and approached the writing-table, evidently with the intention of taking the dust off the corners, but not by any means intending to touch the books or papers.
“Stop!” cried Mrs Rose sternly.
Matty stopped with a guilty look.
“Not a touch,” said Mrs Rose.
“Not even the edges, nor the legs?” inquired the pupil.
“Neither edges nor legs,” said the instructor.
“Sure it could do no harm.”
“Matty,” said Mrs Rose solemnly, “the great thing that your countrywomen have to learn is obedience.”
“Thank ’ee, ’m,” said Matty, who, being overawed by the housekeeper’s solemnity, felt confused, and was uncertain whether the reference to her countrywomen was complimentary or the reverse.
“Now,” continued Mrs Rose, “the matches.”
Matty placed the box of matches on the chimney-piece.
“Very well; now you’ve got to look round to see that all’s right.”
Matty looked round on the dark portraits that covered the walls (supposed to be ancestors), on the shelves of books, great and small, new and old (supposed to be read); on the vases, statuettes, chairs, tables, desks, curtains, papers, etcetera, etcetera, and, being utterly ignorant of what constituted right and what wrong in reference to such things, finally turned her eyes on Mrs Rose with an innocent smile.
“Don’t you see that the shutters are neither shut nor barred, Matty?”
She had not seen this, but she at once went and closed and barred them, in which operation she learned, first, that the bars refused to receive their respective “catches,” with unyielding obstinacy for some time; and, second, that they suddenly gave in without rhyme or reason and pinched her fingers severely.
“Now then, what next?” inquired Mrs Rose.
“Put out the gas,” suggested Matty.
“And leave yourself in the dark,” said the housekeeper, in a tone of playful irony.
“Ah! sure, didn’t I forgit the candle!”
In order to rectify this oversight, Matty laid the unlighted candle which she had brought with her to the room on the writing-table, and going to the chimney-piece, returned with the match-box.
“Be careful now, Matty,” said Mrs Rose earnestly. “There’s nothink I’ve such a fear of as fire. You can’t be too careful.”
This remark made Matty, who was of an anxious temperament, extremely nervous. She struck the match hesitatingly, and lighted the candle shakily. Of course it would not light (candles never do on such occasions), and a long red-hot end of burnt wood projected from the point of the match.
“Don’t let the burnt end drop into the wastepaper basket!” exclaimed Mrs Rose, in an unfortunate moment.
“Where?” exclaimed Matty with a start that sent the red-hot end into the centre of a mass of papers.
“There, just at your feet; don’t be so nervous, girl!” cried Mrs Rose.
Matty, in her anxiety not to drop the match, at once dropped it into the waste-paper basket, which was instantly alight. A stamp of the foot might have extinguished it, but this did not occur to either of the domestics. The housekeeper, who was a courageous woman, seized the basket in both hands and rushed with it to the fireplace, thereby fanning the flame into a blaze and endangering her dress and curls. She succeeded, however, in cramming the basket and its contents into the grate; then the two, with the aid of poker, tongs, and shovel, crushed and beat out the fire.
“There! I said you’d do it,” gasped Mrs Rose, as she flung herself, panting, into Mr Auberly’s easy-chair; “this comes of bein’ in a hurry.”
“I